


City of Sin

by brokenotbroken, freetowrite (brokenotbroken)



Category: Peaky Blinders (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Attempted Rape/Non-Con, Bisexual Tommy Shelby, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Homophobic Language, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Past Abuse, Period-Typical Homophobia, Period-Typical Sexism, Police Brutality, Politics, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Poverty, Sex Work
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-08
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-13 12:53:50
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,448
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29278761
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brokenotbroken/pseuds/brokenotbroken, https://archiveofourown.org/users/brokenotbroken/pseuds/freetowrite
Summary: Grace Burgess is a young police operative sent from Belfast on behalf of the Crown with the mission of cleaning up crime-ridden Birmingham.Tommy Shelby is a 24-year-old prostitute living in poverty in Small Heath.When they cross paths, Grace begins to wonder which side the "bad guys" are on.
Relationships: Grace Burgess/Tommy Shelby
Comments: 2
Kudos: 19





	1. One

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first Peaky fic! I love this show and I've tried to right some more canonical stuff, but it's hard because I have so much faith in the writers of the show and am invested in their plot lines. So instead, I decided to write the context of an alternate universe where, following WWI, instead of becoming a successful gangster, Tommy (who is bi) becomes a gay prostitute. In 1920s England, though, both homosexuality and prostitution are crimes, so he is still on the wrong side of the law. 
> 
> This will likely get political and I am a leftist and highly skeptical of policing in case that's a turnoff. 
> 
> I go back and forth between whether I like Grace on the show (I didn't in the first season-maybe because she's a cop) but I like how soft Tommy is around her and I really wanted to make her a strong female presence in this story. I will also add other character tags as I add chapters (expect more Shelby family!), and it's likely Tommy will have other love affairs and sexual encounters. That being said, this is not a smut story. While I enjoy reading smut, I'm not good at writing it, so the sex scenes will be somewhat vague and more romantic than sexually explicit.
> 
> Also, a brief word about trigger warnings. There is an attempted rape early on, and mentions throughout the story. It is also likely there will be graphic details about addiction and mental health issues so please make sure you're in a space where you can handle that before reading! Enjoy and please comment if you want to read more (it will keep me motivated to write)!

It’s a foggy out, and Grace detests the filthy Birmingham air as she passes through the crumbling streets of Small Heath. Her day has been marked by unpleasant smells—she is returning from a shift at a local pub, where she cleaned up spills of vomit and served beer to sweaty old men. And now, as she inhales the factory smog, she senses another aroma just around the corner—it’s what she came here to find: the smell of blood. 

It’s a dark winter evening, and one man passing by has already lectured her about the dangers of an “attractive young woman like her” walking through town alone. I’m an armed agent of the Crown, she wanted to say, but it was best to keep her front as the harmless barmaid, and pull the gun out of her purse only if necessary. But a streetlamp has illuminated a shadow of a group of figures gathered in an alley, so her she guides her hand to the metal piece in her bag. 

She lays herself flat against a building next to the alley, turning her head quietly to take in the situation without being noticed. Through a weak peripheral glance she makes out a man—small, younger, almost boyish—being held by three men—all significantly larger— facing the wall next to her about twenty feet away. One of the men is holding him down, hand wrapped around the boy’s mouth with a gun pressed to his lower back. Another is tugging the boy’s trousers, and roughing him up, before unfastening his own belt. 

Fuck. Three men with guns, up against one woman. She feels a rush of adrenaline pump through her limbs as she cocks the gun. Usually, she wouldn’t shoot first. She’d give them a chance to surrender, to take them into custody, do it the right way. But she can’t watch this happen. Grace lifts the gun around the corner and fires it at the first man’s head, watching him drop his gun and fall to the ground as blood spills from his skull. The second man reaches for his own gun from his holster but he is too late—Grace hits him too, giving him a fatal bullet in the heart.   
“Hands up or I’ll shoot ya too,” Grace tells the third man. He complies reluctantly, hands shaking mid-air. “I’m an agent of the Crown, and you’re under arrest for attempted rape.”

The boy is on the ground now, curled up in a ball with his hands covering his head.

“He’s a fucking faggot whore, he’s the one you want,” says the man. 

Grace fires a bullet into the man’s stomach, and he shrieks and groans, holding his middle as he watches his blood and guts drain out of him. 

“Really?” Grace says. “It’s a good thing I’m not like you. I don’t like people suffering.” She shoots him again in the head and the groaning stops. 

Grace walks around the bodies to the young man curled up on the ground, his pants pulled down below his undergarments, with scrapes and bruises scattering his arms and face. Looking closer she’d guess he’s in his early-to-mid twenties, and looks bony and underfed. But when he glances up at her and reveals a set of enormous, sparkling blue eyes she can’t help but be captivated by his beauty, even amidst the obvious brokenness. 

“What’s your name, sir?” Grace asks, offering him a hand. 

His hand shakes but he takes hers reluctantly, weakly pulling himself up to sit. “I’m Thomas Shelby, ma’am,” he replies. “Or just Tommy.”

She drops to her knees to meet him at eye level. “It’s nice to meet you Tommy, I’m Grace.” 

“Are you going to arrest me?” he asks, tears emerging in his crystal eyes. 

“Well, I didn’t see you break the law,” Grace reasons. “And I won’t accept this as some sort of confession. I suppose I should apologize for, um…,” she points to the bodies scattering the alley. “I just couldn’t watch them, or let that happen to you…” 

“It’s alright, it’s happened before,” Tommy says, staring at the ground. 

“Do you want me to walk you home, sir?” Grace asks. 

“It’s probably better you don’t know where I live,” he replies, pushing himself up off the ground, and pulling his torn pants back up as he makes his way towards the street.

“Of course, well, do keep safe!” she shouts at him as he walks briskly ahead of her, disappearing into the dark.

Thomas Shelby. Shelby. The name is familiar. Had Inspector Campbell mentioned it to her? But why would Campbell care about a starving, harmless male prostitute?


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry, I write short! Also I don't edit anything before I post it here so I apologize in advance for the (inevitable) grammatical and spelling errors. Comments, kudos, all appreciated.

Ada Shelby shudders as she hears a pounding knock on the door. These days, dating notorious communist Freddie Thorne, anyone could be coming for her. 

“It’s Tommy,” the voice behind the door shouts. 

She opens it and lets him in. “Goodness, Thomas, you look like shit,” she says, eyeing the scratches and bruises covering his cavernous face and collarbones. 

“Well that’s no way to greet me, is it,” he replies. “You got whiskey, Ada?”

“And that’s no way to greet me,” she says, but surrenders to his request, pulling the glass bottle of amber liquid from a shelf near the door. She sets the bottle down on her coffee table, and reaches to get him a glass, but Tommy is already taking a large swig from the bottle. She is both impressed and concerned about how much her brother drinks, him being a fellow only slightly larger than herself. 

He puts the bottle down, sighs, and then picks it up again for another turn. When he brings it down again Ada can see tears welling in his eyes. “Jesus, Tom, did it happen again?” she asks.

“No, no, there was a copper who stopped it,” he replies. “There were three men, I suppose they all wanted a turn, but she shot each one of them dead.”

“She?” Ada was surprised to imagine a woman cop strolling the streets of Birmingham. “So the cops are on your side now, huh. Does she know what you do for a living?” 

“I didn’t come here for you to tell me how ashamed of me you are,” Tommy says. 

“Tommy, that isn’t fair. I’m just worried. This is the third time. You’re going to get yourself killed. Or you’ll end up in jail, and get killed in there,” Ada tells him.

“I don’t want your pity either,” he replies. “I just want to know who they were. The men that attacked me. They said your name.”

Ada’s cheeks begin to burn. The memory comes back. 

A tall, bulky man at her door three nights before. Telling her he wanted Freddie. She had blocked most of it out, and he had his hands around her throat, so her mind was probably strained from a lack of oxygen. Said something about the bloody communists, how he would kill every one of them. 

And if you don’t tell me where he is and how I can get him, the man told her. I’ll have my way with your whore brother. 

Ada gulps. “Shit, Tommy, this is my fault.” She tells him everything. About Freddie, about the strange man, the threat. “I just didn't want them to take Freddie. I didn't think they’d actually—“

“It’s okay, Ada, it’s not your fault,” Tommy replies. “So just a group of anti-communist thugs looking for Freddie? Where is he?”

“Don’t you dare sell him out,” Ada shouts. 

“I would never, Ada, I promise,” he tells her. “I wasn’t going to tell you but, during the war, Freddie and I, well…let’s say your not the first Shelby he’s fucked.” 

“Oh my god Tommy!” she gasps. “I don’t know where he is. But he promised he’d come back. I told him he was in danger—“

“Well, tell him he’s safe,” Tommy says. “I have a plan.”

“Tommy Shelby has a plan?”

“That copper, her name’s Grace,” he tells her. “I’ve seen her at The Garrison. She’s a barmaid. I might be the only one in this town that knows she’s a copper.” 

“So you’ll keep her cover for her?” 

“I will,” he continues. “In return for a favor. I’ll make sure she stops those men, the ones who are after Freddie, the ones who came after me. I know there’s more of them, they said there were, they said they’d come after you. But I won’t let them. She won’t let them.” 

“And how do you know she won’t just have you arrested, keep you from causing any more trouble?” Ada asks.

“Because if she wanted me arrested, she’d already have me by now.”


End file.
